Episode 34: The Knights of Teclis Report

General Summary

The Enemy Within: Death on the Reik Episode 34 - “The Knights of Teclis” 3/30/23 Post-Game Notes   Day 104 - Backertag 22 Brauzeit, 2512 IC   Fresh off of spending time with new Ranaldan friends (God), learning about smuggling and bird-handling from a scruffy-looking albeit charming rogue (Beau), honing woodworking skills in a theatrical workshop (Kris), and dodging diarrhea in a detention cell (Karl), the Crew make their way to Mezzo’s Banqueting House in the Carnival Square.  

After being led to a private dining room by the host, Paolo, Crew is surprised to find a table set for 10, and six people awaiting them. In addition to Gustav and Binroy, the party includes Christophe the Grey Wizard and his confidante/bodyguard Sir Pierre D’Labarque; eccentric Celestial Wizard Hieronymus Blitzen and his sidekick, the apprentice Hans-Peter Schiller.   Before introductions proceed, Gustav requests that the Crew join them in drinking some of Christophe’s special tea, “Engels Herbal Enhancement.”

• Crafted with the aid of Cordelia, the herbalist from Ubersreik
• Alleviates the Altdorf-derived headaches prevalent among sensitive psyches (sixth sense)
• Enhances focus among individuals who can sense magical winds (second sight)
• Makes it difficult to divulge, under duress, the names of anyone sharing a pot of tea, thus offering some protections of secrecy.
• Christophe gives the Crew a sachet containing an addition four preparations of the tea.

Christophe begins by asking for a debrief on Bogenhafen. He just came from there, and learned what he could from Pierre and his local contacts, but the one most vexing element is the provenance of the spell used by Teugen. He shouldn’t have been able to even attempt that ritual.

• Crew presents the letter from Etelka Herzen to Teugen. At mention of Herzen, the lost-in-the-clouds astromancer perks up and wonders is she might be “part of this Cabal?”
• Blitzen warns the Crew that they should be very careful if engaging Herzen.
• 
  Gustav offers some aid in lieu of payment, “since wizards are generally poor,” in the form of a magical gift: Dwarven Ring of Protection (+10 to tests related to material undead).

The Cabal seems to be a secret enclave of rogue wizards bent on bypassing the Colleges of Magic’s restrictions on human sorcery for their own nefarious purposes. They are likely behind the murder of Lena’s magister and the pursuit of Sindriane’s grimoire and the cards comprising The Deck of Many Things.

• Christophe recently discovered that the astromancer Sibylle Hagerdorn, former guardian of The Vale, is a member of this Cabal. The bigger problem is that she used to part of this no-longer-secret round table, the self-proclaimed “Knights of Teclis.”
• If Herzen, a bright wizard, is part of this Cabal, she could be one of the group’s competitors for recovering the cards.

The Knights of Teclis is a group of wizards, one from each wind, dedicated to protecting the Empire and upholding the restriction on specialization. Each wizard has one lieutenant.

• Christophe represents the grey wind, accompanied by Sir Pierre.
• Gustav represents the amethyst wind, accompanied by his dreamwalking partner Binroy.
• Blitzen, from Delberz, is being recruited to replace Hagerdorn as the representative of the blue wind. He is accompanied by Schiller.
• Four of the other colors are not present, and their identities remain secret. The group lacks an amber wizard.
• The Cabal (thanks to the traitor Hagerdorn) may know the identities of most of the Knights, but the Knights still hold the only known copy of Sindriane’s grimoire, a necessary component to use the Deck of Many Things.

The Crew show the wizards the Piper card recovered from the Pandemonium Carnival and the clues pertaining to the Cult of the Purple Hand.

• The Piper card is said to turn the target of the spell into the thrall of the caster.
• The Knights are more concerned with a Chaos cult called The Red Crown, but the Purple Hand may be just as sinister and dangerous. Luckily, these Chaos cults, even ones worshiping the same god, are often at odds with one another, which seems to keep some of their more daunting plans in check.
• Crew is asked to hold on to the Piper card, because it may help them locate additional cards, including one purported to be in Kemperbad.

Binroy came back from an investigative trip to The Great Hospice where he spent time with the crazy former Imperial Engineer Gerd von Plotzkanal before the man passed away. He is the mad genius behind the enigmatic clocktower in Kemperbad, and this engineer, who slowly went crazy before finally being committed to the Hospice by his family, was known to have a deck of cards close at hand. There is a suspicion that his creation of the tower was aided by Sidriane’s The Bonesaw card. No cards accompanied the man to the Hospice, so it may be among his belongings back in Kemperbad.

• Crew is asked to adventure on to Kemperbad to see if they can locate a card.
• From there, follow up the leads to Grissenwald to investigate Etelka Herzen.
• Schiller has a potion that he prepared, along with the recovered grimoire with Hindemith’s Ritual of Rediscovery, that should aid the adventurers.

Hans-Peter’s Hildemith Potion:

• After the theft of this rare grimoire was traced to a casting in Stromdorf, Christophe thought he had tracked down a member of the Cabal looking for cards. Turned out to be a different issue, but the spell inspired an idea.
• The spell, when cast on disparate parts of a once-unified magical artifact, allows the caster to visualize or track the locations of missing parts.
• Hans-Peter’s potion mimics this effect with just a drop, but shelf-life and range are indeterminate.
• They test it out with Kris’s Amulet of Thrice-Blessed Copper: Christophe holds the companion artifact, and God is able to follow a jade wind-induced vision to see that the grey wizard wears it around his neck. They then test it out with the Piper card, and God similarly follows a maelstrom of magical energy (watch out for that corruption!) to visualize the Greased Goat card secreted in Christophe’s crotch.
• Crew receives a vial with 12 more uses and is asked to keep the Piper card with them as they look for other cards.

Christophe and Blitzen are headed north to Salzenmund via Delberz to look into some other leads.

• Use the enchanted foolscap (given to the Crew by Sir Pierre in Bogenhafen) to relay messages by way of Ubersreik.

Gustav and Binroy are headed to Carroburg to kill undead and try and recruit an amber wizard.   The Crew is asked to go to Kemperbad to try and track down the Bonesaw card and then on to Grissenwald to hunt down Herzen.   The Crew show off Godabert’s cat statue and promote Zucker’s cache of Arabyan oddities. Crew agrees to meet back here in six weeks’ time.   The dinner, by the way, was the best meal any of the Crew members had ever had.   That night, Godabert tests Hans-Peter’s potion again to check range. He successfully locates Christophe’s Goat card several miles away in the northwest part of the city, but the strain to avoid corruption is more pronounced.   Day 105 - Bezahltag 23 Brauzeit, 2512 IC   The Crew readies The Wrecking Ball for departure. On their way out the southern river gate, Godabert catches a glimpse of a familiar face boarding a Four Seasons Coach near the docks – Ernst Heidelman, the erstwhile medical student last encountered at the Coach and Horses north of Altdorf and to whom belongs that sinister leather case with the Red Crown sueded inlay. Ernst makes eye contact with Godabert, and then ducks out of sight, clearly concerned.   Rather than continue on to The Skull & Crown, the Crew makes an earlier stop in the forested village of Autler to see if they can waylay Ernst on his way south (assuming this is the one of two possible routes that his coach could have taken out of Altdorf).

• Closest tavern to the road, Vain Robert’s Gibbet, is full of drunk farmers enjoying post-harvest season, and a handful of travelers.
• Kris stays on the boat with Cameron the Crow and scouts up river with his Lens of the Sky. He observes one of the Emperor’s signal towers under construction a ways to the southeast.
• A young woman, dressed in traveling leathers, comes in to the tavern. Karl overhears her ordering a glass of milk and, after an awkward pause, a beer. She turns to look at the trio and when Godabert turns around, he finds her staring at him.
• Beau’s spider-sense tingles, alerting him to someone or something outside. He and Karl go outside to investigate. Something is moving among the trees just north of the tavern.
• 
  God questions an arriving coach and learns that someone matching Ernst’s description hurriedly got off the coach in Kalbach, just outside Altdorf.
• Beau cautiously enters the woods and comes face to face to with a great cat. It pounces and misses him, and Beau prepares to engage. Karl loads his crossbow as another cat jumps from behind some foliage.
• The woman rushes outside to protect “her friends” and Godabert gives chase. The cats take up a protective position around her, but they are also very interested in Godabert. Weapons are lowered and cooler heads prevail; she introduces herself as Emmaretta and she is traveling by foot to Fielbach to post bail for her fiance who was arrested unfairly. These cats, her friends, follow and protect her.
• Godabert, a bit smitten and always a sucker for the plight of the downtrodden, offers the woman, Emmaretta, a ride. He impresses her with his charm and she agrees, but insists that all her money needs to be given to the authorities in town. God doesn’t really check with anyone first. Karl and Beau give him a bit of the ol’ “what the fuck?” full-body shrug. Apparently Emmaretta expects the cats to follow the boat from the treeline.

Day 106 - Konistag 24 Brauzeit, 2512 IC   The boat continues upriver and, around noon, encounters an anchored barge, The Maria Borger, whose captain is signaling for help.

• The captain, Bernhardt Dampfer, says two of his crewmen have taken ill and they need a healer. With only four people working the boat, this has left them painfully shorthanded.
• Godabert, again quite the softie (or maybe to impress Emmaretta), agrees to have a look.
• One of Bernhardt’s sons, Karl, and the other crewman, Hans Vollrat, lie in their bunks, barely able to move and looking deathly pale. The other son, Reiner, explains that they’ve been that way since the night before last.
• Godabert helps relieve their fever and notices two small puncture holes on their neck. He then inquires about their cargo – just one giant crate, headed to Altdorf.
• Godabert convinces Bernhardt – using a combination of charm and medical advice – that the seal on this crate should be broken and the contents investigated, despite his charter. Beau, Kris, and Karl are recruited to help.
• 
  The crate is opened, revealing two wooden coffins. First is opened – a layer of dirt. The second is opened – a pale, but not-quite-dead gentleman in courtly old-fashioned clothes. Godabert examines more closely… and wakes up the vampire!
• The battle is joined, and Godabert loses a lot of blood, and nearly his life, to the supernaturally quick creature. Kris throws a crowbar at it, misses, and knocks out Bernhardt. As soon as Beau and Karl get their shit together, they help combat the beast and, despite the tight confines, chase it away up the ship ladder.
• Beau finds it in the upper cabin, drinking blood from Karl Dampfer, and clobbers it again. This time the red mist shoots through the cabin window, out over The Wrecking Ball and a confused Emmaretta, and dissipates over the river.
• They find a golden seal, bearing that same strange heraldry, in the coffin with the dirt. Bernhardt agrees to dump the coffins and crate into the river, and never speak of this again. The Crew is given the seal as payment for their help.
• In the evening, under moonlight, Beau copies the seal emblem onto one of the sheafs of enchanted foolscap in preparation for sending it to Christophe for possible identification.

  Interlude:   The sun sets beyond the distant Hagercrybs as the Crew pulls into the Fielbach docks. The rest of the afternoon’s journey had been relatively quiet, with Emmaretta nursing Godabert’s wounds while three of his more social cats nuzzle under his arms.   Beau mutters something about “the fiance” while tossing worms to Cameron.   * * *

Rewards Granted

XP:

• 25 for nicely role-playing the meeting with The Knights of Teclis and agreeing to continue adventuring on the group’s behalf (all)
• 25 for befriending Emmaretta and not harming her great cats (all)
• 15 for ignoring any temptations to meta-game his ass to safety when opening a coffin that very obviously contains a fucking vampire (Godabert)
• 25 for chasing away the sinister vampire. I’m sure we’ve seen the last of him. (all)
• 35 for a great session, kicking off the next big arc! (all)

• Godabert: 125
• Beau: 110
• Karl: 110
• Kris: 110

  Loot:

• Sachet of Engels’s Herbal Enhancement (four preparations)
• Dwarven Ring of Protection
• Hans-Peter’s Hildemith Potion (11 uses)
• A golden seal bearing the heraldry of some ancient family

Character(s) interacted with

Locations scouted and new NPC’s engaged:   Wolftor District, Altdorf:

• Curt Finck, fencing tutor, Temple of Ranald
• Horst Valdman, hunter, Temple of Ranald

Old Docks District, Altdorf:

• Earnest Erich, Fish gang-leader who holds court outside The Broken Barrel Tavern
• Hans Ohloe, charming and inspirational smuggler
• Nestie Schlupwinkel, pigeon & crow trainer who runs a shit-covered shop in the Old Docks

Mauerblumchen District, Altdorf:

• Severina “The Grey” Hallovadottir, dwarven artisan and set designer for Theatre of Altdorf

Carnival Square, Altdorf

• Paolo, host at Mezzo’s Banqueting House
• Hieronymus Blitzen, Celestial Master Wizard (astromancer) from Delberz and one of the “Knights of Teclis”
• Hans-Peter Schiller, Celestial apprentice to Blitzen and burgeoning potion master

Vain Robert’s Gibbet, Autler

• Emmaretta, hunter traveling in the company of two Great Cats

The Maria Borger, cargo barge along the Reik

• Bernhardt Dampfer, barge captain
• Karl Dampfer, crew, son
• Reiner Dampfer, crew, son
• Hans Vollrat, crew
• A vampire… vanquished? Maybe?